Zero Rss

Hegseth Pushes $1.5 Trillion Military Budget As Tribute To Lindsey Graham

Authored by Dave DeCamp via AntiWar.com,

US Secretary of War Pete Hegseth called on Congress to approve his request for a $1.5 trillion military budget for 2027 during remarks at a ceremony in South Carolina for the renaming of Joint Base Charleston to Joint Base Lindsey Graham in honor of the late Sen. Lindsey Graham, who died unexpectedly last month.

Hegseth claimed that before he died, Graham told him that the $1.5 trillion request was the best military budget he'd ever seen.

Department of War photo

"As we gather here today, the War Department is seeking a historic generational investment of $1.5 trillion for American warriors. And Lindsey himself said, to me in his office, ‘this is the best military budget I’ve seen since I’ve been in Congress,'" Hegseth said, according to a transcript released by the Pentagon.

"This department pays tribute to Lindsey Graham in the naming of this base, but there could be no greater tribute than Congress could give than to invest in our warriors for the full $1.5 trillion," he added.

Hegseth said that he had known Graham for nearly 20 years, going back to when he was a member of a veterans group pushing for the US to escalate the war in Iraq.

"Nineteen years ago, young lieutenant, uh, First Lieutenant Pete Hegseth came back from Iraq and was a part of a veterans’ organization called Vets for Freedom that believed in the surge in Iraq and advocated for the troops on the ground," he said. "The first and only senator willing to meet with First Lieutenant Pete Hegseth and nowheresville Vets for Freedom was Sen. Lindsey Graham."

The event came as Hegseth has been struggling to get support from Congress for the full $1.5 trillion military budget, a nearly 50% increase from this year’s budget.

The Trump administration seeks to reach that figure through a $1.15 trillion National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) plus a supplemental funding bill worth about $350 billion. Hegseth said that he and Graham discussed the plan just a week before the senator’s death.

Secretary of War Pete Hegseth was joined today by Secretary of the Air Force Dr. Troy E. Meink, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster, and Sen. Darline Graham for the renaming of Joint Base Charleston, South Carolina, as Joint Base Lindsey Graham,… pic.twitter.com/5dz6TvGOhB

— OSINTdefender (@sentdefender) August 10, 2026

"He looked at me and said, how’s $355 billion sound? He wanted to give even more than $350 billion. He wanted to ensure our military was as equipped as humanly possible, because he was thinking of places like this one right here," Hegseth said.

Hegseth was joined at the ceremony by Darline Graham, Lindsey Graham’s sister, who has taken over his Senate seat and is expected to pursue the same policies as her brother. Lindsey Graham was notorious for his hawkishness, and following his death, footage came out of him laughing and celebrating days after the start of the US-Israeli bombing campaign in Iran, a war he had been pushing for years.

Tyler Durden Tue, 08/11/2026 - 17:00

Phoebe Gates & Co-Founder Caught In The Cookie Jar: Slack Logs Contradict Phia's '24-Hour Bug' BS

When Bloomberg first caught Phia - the AI "personal shopping assistant" co-founded by Bill Gates' daughter Phoebe Gates and climate-activist-turned-founder Sophia Kianni - claiming affiliate commissions on sales it had nothing to do with, the company's ham-fisted damage control was a Silicon Valley classic: an unfortunate software bug, discovered "within the last 24 hours" - and of course it was 'fixed immediately.' 

Except that's total bullshit. 

According to a follow-up investigation published Tuesday, they knew about it for at least seven months - and Gates along with other execs were actively pushing for its use, according to internal Slack messages and people familiar with the matter.

Phoebe Gates

According to the report, an internal dashboard screenshot shows the automatic cookie-dropping behavior was a named feature flag that could be toggled remotely - independent researcher Ben Edelman identified it in Phia's own code as enable_coupon_auto_drop. It was reportedly switched on December 10 and switched off July 7 - which happens to be the day Bloomberg first reached out for comment. Two people familiar with the matter confirmed the toggle meant the feature was live. So after seven months, the "bug" was magically cured the moment a reporter shot off an email. 

The Bug = The Business

A Phia data scientist estimated in a July 7 Slack message that cookie stuffing accounted for roughly 51% of the gross merchandise value the company claimed credit for in June, per Bloomberg. An internal revenue chart reportedly tells the same story: when the features went dark in early July, average daily revenue collapsed from about $80,000 to somewhere between $10,000 and $28,000.

The company disputes the math - a spokesperson called the 51% figure a preliminary analysis built on flawed methodology, and says the revenue cliff also reflects Phia voluntarily shutting down most of its monetization at the same time. Except - when switching off the "bug" vaporizes the majority of your revenue, that's the business. 

The receipts

For readers unfamiliar with the affiliate marketing underworld: publishers earn commissions by dropping a tracking cookie when a shopper intentionally interacts with them - clicking a referral link, applying a coupon. Dropping cookies without user interaction is called cookie stuffing, it's prohibited by essentially every affiliate network contract, and it works by hijacking credit (and commission) from whoever actually drove the sale.

Per Bloomberg, here's what the founders were doing while their future PR statement about a 24-hour-old bug was still unwritten:

• December 18: Gates, worried that Etsy commissions were coming in light, pressed developers on Slack to confirm that automatic cookie-drops were live across every site offering a coupon - so the company would monetize all merchandise value flowing through checkout. When an engineer confirmed cookies were being set even when shoppers never touched a coupon, she reportedly reiterated that every transaction should be captured regardless. (Phia's explanation: she was concerned a broken pop-up meant users weren't seeing coupons, which would also depress attribution. Noted.)
• October through July: a feature internally dubbed "passive trigger" reportedly re-dropped a Phia cookie every two hours on any top-1,000 website where the user had ever interacted with the extension - potentially steamrolling other publishers' legitimate referrals along the way. Bloomberg says its review of Phia's historical source code confirmed the features existed.
• A second feature, also per Bloomberg, reportedly set a cookie if a shopper clicked anywhere on the page after Phia's pop-up appeared - including while trying to close it.
• Kianni, after a colleague warned that dropping cookies on dismiss events violates Google's Chrome extension policy, reportedly floated the idea of claiming users had been trying to open the extension and simply reversing charges if anyone complained - before cheering the team on to keep the cookies dropping by whatever means available. (A spokesperson says that particular feature was never implemented or launched.)

Oh, and the Slack exchanges in question? Per two people familiar with the matter, they're no longer visible to Phia employees. Memory-holed, as it were.

Sophia Kianni and Phoebe Gates announce Phia, a digital fashion platform. Credit : Emma McIntyre/Getty

Ben Edelman - the advertising consultant who has spent 20 years dismantling deceptive marketing schemes - reviewed Phia's source code and merchant data, corroborated Bloomberg's findings, and described a multipart effort engineered to inflate Phia's revenue while delivering nothing to merchants. His suggestion that the founders should have spent more time reading their contracts and less time building tricks is about as polite as this gets. Phia declined to comment on his analysis.

Sound familiar?

It should. This is the Honey playbook - the same last-click attribution hijacking that blew up in PayPal's face in late 2024 and spawned a wave of class actions and a creator revolt. The difference is that Honey's scandal was reconstructed from the outside. Phia's, per Bloomberg, comes with the founders' own fingerprints on the toggle. And cookie stuffing isn't some novel gray area: a decade ago, in the infamous eBay affiliate cases, it ended in federal wire-fraud pleas.

The fallout is already rolling. Affiliate network Impact.com suspended Phia from its marketplace after Bloomberg's first story and is reallocating unpaid commissions attributed to the startup since June 20. Phia has begun repaying retailers - and with the timeline now stretching back to at least December rather than July, that refund bill is unlikely to shrink. Nike, Gap and Nordstrom, all reportedly among the affected merchants, did not respond to Bloomberg's requests for comment.

One question the piece leaves hanging: Phia announced a $35 million Series A led by Notable Capital on January 27, at a $185 million valuation - roughly seven weeks after the auto-drop toggle reportedly went live, and weeks after that December Slack thread. The launch announcement touted, among other things, a 40% increase in monetized GMV. The growth metrics were, evidently, impressive. It's just that, if Bloomberg's reporting holds, a meaningful chunk of that growth may have belonged to somebody else.

Phia, for its part, says all misattribution features were removed on July 7, that it is reviewing every transaction and issuing reversals to brand partners, and that it is hiring a head of compliance - a role whose necessity apparently revealed itself the same day Bloomberg's phone number did. The company adds that it remains focused on giving users the best possible shopping experience, including its new digital closet feature.

But sure. It was a bug.

Tyler Durden Tue, 08/11/2026 - 16:40

Not Winning? Just Change The Rules...

Authored by Victor Davis Hanson via American Greatness,

What binds the new Democratic Party to the new Democratic Socialists is a set of shared issues and values. That is, the radicalism of the Democrats in the age of Trump Derangement Syndrome - lawfare, de-balloting, the Mar-a-Lago raid, and calls to destroy the Electoral College, the nine-justice Supreme Court, and the filibuster - helped give birth to the socialists.

U.S. Capitol Police move in to remove anti-war protesters interrupting Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth testifying on June 24, 2026 Bill Clark/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images

But the overriding commonality among those on the new Left is that if they do not get their way, they blame the "system." Then they seek to change the rules, no matter how hallowed those laws and conventions may have been or how much they themselves benefited from them in the past.

When the Left lost the White House, Congress, and, for the most part, the Supreme Court, it began clamoring to change the system. For left-wing Democrats, that angst also translated into calls to bring in two new blue states, weaponize the FBI and DOJ, ally with social media to suppress the news, and spy on congressional representatives. All the socialists and communists did was up the ante in destroying norms by calling for the end of the presidency, the Senate, the border, the police, and the Pentagon.

By 2021, it was time to destroy the southern border and welcome in some 10 million illegal immigrants - without audits, English proficiency, health checks, or the ability to support themselves.

Had Kamala Harris been elected in 2024, we would have had another four years and another five million illegal aliens. And perhaps America would have gone from 50 million foreign-born residents to 60 million, or about 18 percent of the population.

In this regard, the Left sees California as our most liberal - and most ideal - state and perhaps concludes that the reason is that 28 percent of its resident population is now foreign-born, with the majority arriving with vast needs for health, education, housing, and food subsidies.

Today, 50 percent of all births in California are paid for by Medi-Cal, which serves 40 percent of the population. When second-generation immigrants are added to the foreign-born population, the two groups together comprise roughly 45 percent of California's current population. This demographic transformation is one of the most profound in American history and came at a time when traditional civic education stressing assimilation, acculturation, integration, and knowledge of American traditions, history, and values was nearly nonexistent in California public schools.

So one way of achieving radical change was to alter the demography and welcome as many immigrants as possible who, in the first or second generation, might follow the examples of Reps. Rashida Tlaib, Ilhan Omar, and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani, or Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed. They represent an entirely new sort of immigrant who arrives - or is born to immigrant parents - with both complaints against and dependence on their host country. They can see only the sins of America, never the catastrophes of their homeland that drove them or their parents here. This strange demand to change the rules whenever they do not bode well for angry and aggrieved parties permeates every possible manifestation of the Left, but is especially egregious when demanded by immigrants who came originally as uninvited guests but almost immediately damned their magnanimous host.

It is strange for so many new immigrants to act on an elemental desire to reach America - only on arrival to profess that it is full of toxic, sinful people, living and dead. Yet the damned hosts have inexplicably welcomed total strangers like themselves, and have allowed them to share in the freedom, security, and prosperity created by the dead whom the newcomers nonetheless endlessly slander and smear.

If particular minorities statistically did not do as well on the SAT as Asians and whites did on average, the solution was certainly not SAT tutorials in the inner city or K-12 SAT outreach, demands for tougher classes in grammar, math, and analytics, or a return to the melting pot rather than the current salad-bowl tribalist model.

Instead, after the George Floyd riots, the call went out to abolish the SAT entirely - as if there had never been a purpose behind its creation. In fact, merit-based SAT exams were designed in the 1920s and 1930s to allow anyone, regardless of race, gender, region, or class, to enter college through meritorious performance on the tests - and, in particular, to overcome old-boy insider preferences and regional and ethnic prejudices.

Yet when the SAT was mostly abolished for four or five years, higher education thought it had solved the problem of minority underrepresentation.

In fact, its racialist war on standards only magnified its dilemmas. The SAT had once informed admissions officers not only about applicants' qualifications but also whether admitted students could do the work once enrolled.

But soon liberal professors learned that many of the newly admitted cohorts lacked the K-12 training necessary to do customary university coursework. Yet if professors maintained their regular courses, requirements, and grading, they might soon be labeled racists once particular minorities were shown to do less well than Asians and whites.

So universities inflated grades. They introduced new remedial and gut courses. And they reduced the required coursework. But again, racialism is never a solution to problems. Instead, it is a catalyst that fuels them - as we have seen with the new notion that plagiarism is not an actionable offense when the culprit can plead victim status, whether a former president of Harvard or a current professor at Cambridge. But there are ancient laws and norms that insist intellectual theft is a crime and should be punished, not rewarded or ignored.

Soon employers noticed that the reading, writing, and analytical skills of graduates from prestigious schools were proving dismal. Alumni complained both that the reputations of their almae matres were in decline and resting on the fumes of the past and that their own children, who had prepared diligently to ensure suitably competitive grades and SAT scores for admission, were being rejected solely on the basis of their race.

The Left likewise pushed for lower physical standards for the military's ground-combat brigades so that women, on average far less strong than their male counterparts, could join elite units. Again, the same ignorance and arrogance were evident. Physical standards were based on a century of combat experience in which morale, group discipline, and unit success rested on ensuring that all soldiers achieved a common level of physical strength and endurance.

This neo-Marxist-driven demand to mandate equality - albeit now substituting racial and gender consciousness for class consciousness - requires the destruction of established traditions, laws, and norms. The radical Left's key agendas - defunding the police, destroying the border, granting mass amnesties to illegal aliens, subsidizing wind and solar energy while waging a war on fossil fuels, and expanding racial essentialism in hiring and admissions - have never won more than 30 to 40 percent support among the general public. Yet the solution was not to ask why, and then to reflect, reboot, and recalibrate in order to discover how the Left had lost public support.

Instead, the solution was to alter or destroy the system that had denied them power.

So communists, socialists, and radical Democrats prefer moving the goalposts. When equality of opportunity was largely achieved, next they demanded a mandated equality of outcome.

With the ascendancy of a large, affluent middle class, the Left, in its eternal search for a victimized class, pivoted and replaced class oppression with racial victimization.

And when there were not yet enough victimized minorities to guarantee a majority constituency of the aggrieved, the Left redefined the victimized to include anyone who was not a white heterosexual male, regardless of income and privilege.

And when the people finally tired of the Leftists' totalitarian social engineering, the Left sought to change the system by radically altering the way Americans vote, the manner in which government is formed and functions, and, finally, the very demography of America.

The common denominator? Human nature revolts at forced statism, coercive redistribution, and government-mandated equality of results. It instead yearns for liberty and freedom.

No matter how much deception, camouflage, or brainwashing is employed, statism, socialism, and communism can never sustain public support. Throughout history, the Left has therefore begun by changing the rules and altering the demography - if not initially through changes to election rules, bureaucratic fiat, and biased court orders, then eventually through sheer violence.

Victor Davis Hanson is a distinguished fellow of the Center for American Greatness and the Martin and Illie Anderson Senior Fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution. He is an American military historian, columnist, a former classics professor, and scholar of ancient warfare. He has been a visiting professor at Hillsdale College since 2004, and is the 2023 Giles O'Malley Distinguished Visiting Professor at the School of Public Policy, Pepperdine University. Hanson was awarded the National Humanities Medal in 2007 by President George W. Bush, and the Bradley Prize in 2008.

Tyler Durden Tue, 08/11/2026 - 16:20

The Diamond Crash Accelerates

The Diamond Standard Index, tracked on Bloomberg under the ticker DIAMINDX, tumbled to new record lows during the first half of August as a surge in affordable lab-grown stones eroded the scarcity premium underpinning natural diamond prices.

"Technological progress in growing diamonds in labs has been amazing. It's no surprise most engagement rings are now using lab diamonds," X user Crémieux said.

Technological progress in growing diamonds in labs has been amazing.

It's no surprise most engagement rings are now using lab diamonds. https://t.co/MZ4zWVlQNq pic.twitter.com/fH1lFYD3Ih

— Crémieux (@cremieuxrecueil) August 8, 2026

X user Saul Sadka warned that the diamond downturn will likely persist for years as lab-grown stones flood the market:

Expect the collapse in diamond prices to accelerate substantially over the next few years. The natural-diamond market is shrinking in both size and value and circling the drain following the commoditization of its product by modern technology. The same thing happened to pearls 100 years ago, but it will be much worse for diamonds: they will become a signal of bad taste rather than wealth, just as pearls went from high society to a matronly cliché within 50 years.

I have been telling friends in the diamond industry to find a new line of work for ten years. It was clearly only a matter of time before lab-grown diamonds became a mass-market commodity, sold at some small premium over production costs, which would themselves continue to plummet.

Since they are identical to natural diamonds, and buyers actually have multiple reasons to choose them instead, including no "blood diamonds" and supposedly greater environmental friendliness, most buyers will not care.

Attempts to differentiate the products using $20,000 machines will not help: they are indistinguishable in real life.

There was always going to be some multiple that people would be willing to pay for "natural" over "lab," but it did not really matter whether that multiple was 2× or 10×. Once lab-grown diamonds can be made for next to nothing, even ten times next to nothing is still very little. People will pay more, perhaps much more, for an identical product because of its backstory, but not infinitely more.

The reason natural-diamond prices have held up reasonably well over the past four years, "only" falling by around 50% in real terms, has more to do with supply cutbacks. Production has been reduced by about 20% over that period, from 120 million to 98 million carats, in a desperate attempt to support prices as the natural and lab-grown markets diverge. If production returned to its previous level, prices would fall even faster.

But it is going to get much, much worse. A trip to Miami will explain why: people who look like gangsters walk around wearing enormous tennis bracelets that would have cost a million dollars 20 years ago but can now be purchased for the price of a used Rolex.

Diamonds are going to become a sign of tackiness, as, frankly, they always should have been, rather than class or exclusivity. And then the game will be up for everyone in the diamond industry.

Expect the collapse in diamond prices to accelerate substantially over the next few years. The natural-diamond market is shrinking in both size and value and circling the drain following the commoditisation of its product by modern technology. The same thing happened to pearls… https://t.co/XdHRsgSp6h pic.twitter.com/c0zHoUqi2L

— Saul Sadka (@Saul_Sadka) August 9, 2026

Sadka continued in a series of follow-up tweets:

One of the biggest problems for hopes of a residual natural-diamond industry is that diamonds ARE, in fact, FOREVER. At some point, the market will shrink to the point where the secondhand supply, fed by the estates of Boomers as they fall off this mortal coil, will provide sufficient supply to make any mining or polishing uneconomic.

One of the biggest problems for hopes of a residual natural diamond industry is that diamonds ARE, in fact, FOREVER. At some point, the market will shrink to the point where second-hand supply, fed by the estates of Boomers as they fall off this mortal coil, will provide… pic.twitter.com/VkOhukpH5I

— Saul Sadka (@Saul_Sadka) August 10, 2026

This would have been true 30 years ago, and it would have been a big blow to the Israeli economy, but it's not true anymore. The industry once accounted for up to 3% of Israeli GDP, but it's now under 0.2%. Sorry, Turkey.

This would have been true 30 years ago, it would have been a big blow to the Israeli economy, but it's not true anymore. They once were up to 3% of Israeli GDP, but its not under 0.2%.

Sorry Turkey. pic.twitter.com/pORcoY4GcK

— Saul Sadka (@Saul_Sadka) August 10, 2026

There might be some limited residual market at the high end, but my guess is that there will be enough supply from Boomers as they "check out" to glut that demand without any need for miners or cutters, etc.

There might be some limited residual market at the high end, but my guess is that there will be enough supply from the boomers as they "check out" to glut that demand without any need for miners or cutters etc.

— Saul Sadka (@Saul_Sadka) August 10, 2026

To sum up: natural diamonds face a structural, rather than cyclical, collapse. If you're in the market for an engagement ring and hoping it will serve as some store of value, you might be out of luck because lab-grown stones are destroying the scarcity premium, while a potential wave of secondhand supply from aging Baby Boomers could pressure the market even further. 

Tyler Durden Tue, 08/11/2026 - 15:40

Judge (Partly) Rejects Minnesota Bid To Block Trump Admin Title IX Rules On Trans Students

Authored by Kimberley Hayek via The Epoch Times,

A federal judge on Monday largely dismissed Minnesota’s lawsuit challenging the Trump administration’s interpretation of Title IX, the 1972 law that bars sex discrimination in federally funded education programs and activities.

U.S. District Chief Judge Eric Tostrud of the District of Minnesota ruled that most of the state’s claims fell short.

Minnesota had argued that the administration violated the Administrative Procedure Act and the 10th Amendment by determining that the state’s policies allowing transgender students to compete on sports teams and use facilities consistent with their gender identity breached federal law. Tostrud determined that the administration’s findings and related letters to the state to enforce Title IX did not constitute final agency action that could be challenged under the Administrative Procedure Act. The findings and letters themselves, he wrote, imposed “no legal injury on Minnesota.”

He also referenced a June Supreme Court decision upholding state bans on male athletes in female sports. While the high court did not rule on whether states or schools may allow such participation, the judge said its determination that “sex” in Title IX refers to biological sex offers “at least some support” for the administration’s reading of the statute.

Part of Lawsuit Still Standing

The orders also outlined penalties for federally funded entities that allow male athletes to compete in women’s sports. The administration used the threats of withholding federal education funding to press school districts to end policies allowing students to act based on their gender identity.

Tostrud left intact Minnesota’s challenge tied to the potential loss of roughly $2.9 billion in federal funding, finding that it presented a concrete injury for the court to consider.

The judge noted that the funding issue was a separate issue from challenging the interpretation of Title IX, as the state did not have “sufficiently clear notice” of Title IX’s prohibition on transgender women and girls at the time it accepted the federal funding.

Minnesota stands as the only state to sue President Donald Trump and his administration over his executive orders this term defining sex as binary.

The Justice Department’s enforcement action against the Minnesota Department of Education and the Minnesota State High School League for violating Title IX by allowing males to compete against and access intimate spaces designated for females remains pending.

The Minnesota Attorney General’s office has defended the state’s longstanding policies as consistent with the Minnesota Human Rights Act, which prohibits discrimination based on gender identity. The state has maintained that executive orders and agency findings cannot override state law or rewrite Title IX without proper process.

Tyler Durden Tue, 08/11/2026 - 15:20

Putin Pardons Ailing Former US Marine After Years In Russian Prison

A Marine veteran who had been held in Russian prisons since his arrest in January 2022 has been released back to US custody, reportedly after a consistent pressure campaign from Trump administration officials and global advocacy groups.

32-year old Robert Gilman, a former US Marine and English teacher imprisoned in Russia, is said to have received direct pardon from President Vladimir Putin based on humanitarian reasons, given reports say Gilman's health has been rapidly deteriorating. Soon after Gilman's arrest he was slapped with an steep eight-year prison sentence for allegedly kicking a police officer while drunk, followed by an alleged assault on a prison official, according to court records.

Robert Gilman, via Reuters

Gilman had actually following his jailing owned up to the attacks on prison staff - but claimed self-defense and that he was provoked and responding to insults.

Gilman's family as well as advocacy groups say he was wrongfully detained on false charges, and further that was held as a bargaining chip for future possible prisoner swap with Washington. Here's how one such US non-profit organization characterized his arrest:

Robert is a Marine Corps veteran, who was traveling in Russia when he fell sick on a train. Instead of medical help, he was taken to a police station. He fell into a cycle of charges, which began with a case that was dismissed, a second that was without evidence, and a third for assault of a police officer where even the police officer says he should not be charged.

A typical Russian Government tactic is getting Americans into their system, and pile on various unfounded charges to keep them there. This is Robert’s story, and they continue to put him in conditions that set him up for further charges that further politicize his case. Beyond this, the profile of the case against Robert appears eerily familiar to the Trevor Reed case, where a former Marine unexpectedly blacked out and was charged with punching a police officer, suggesting this may all have been staged.

So there does seem to be an admission that Gilman indeed acted violently toward law enforcement officials. The whole situation might be a politicized case, but it's also the reality that Americans sometimes do stupid and drunken criminal acts abroad. 

According to more on the context of the American citizen's release:

Gilman’s sudden release comes after his family and the hostage advocacy group Global Reach had appealed to Moscow for his release, warning that he was “near death” following months of alleged torture in Russian prison. U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio was also said to have raised Gilman’s imprisonment with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov during a meeting in the Philippines last month.

The family and some US officials are alleging that the former Marine was tortured while in Russian prisons, including being subject to mind-altering drug injections:

And according to Reuters:

But Eric Lebson, chief strategy ​officer of Global Reach, an advocacy group representing Gilman's family, told Reuters last week that Gilman was moved in late ​June from the prison hospital to the psychiatric ward of a civilian emergency hospital in ⁠a catatonic-like state assessed as a "dissociative stupor."

The U.S. officials said Gilman on Tuesday was on a State Department plane ​carrying him from Russia to Washington Dulles Airport.

BREAKING: U.S. Marine veteran Robert Gilman, a Lowell native detained in Russia since 2022, has been released after advocates raised dire concerns about his health. pic.twitter.com/njUt3OQt5D

— WCVB-TV Boston (@WCVB) August 11, 2026

However, concerning his current state of health while being transferred back to America, there is this line in Reuters: "All ​things considered he seems to be in good shape," an unnamed US official said.

It is as yet unclear if a prisoner swap will emerged, but so far there's been no word of any Russians being released from US custody. There may have as yet been other undisclosed incentives that Moscow was responding to.

Trump quickly took to social media...

🚨 GREAT NEWS: President Trump just secured the release of American Robert Gilman from a Russian prison. The former U.S. Marine is coming home tonight. Russia agreed to free him with no exchange required. This is another major win for bringing Americans home. Welcome back to… pic.twitter.com/kutNhNN2H2

— Commentary Donald J. Trump Posts From Truth Social (@TrumpDailyPosts) August 11, 2026 Tyler Durden Tue, 08/11/2026 - 15:00

Hormuz Traffic Sank To Just Six Vessels Monday

Vessel traffic at the Strait of Hormuz continues to decline as last week’s hopes of negotiations of a U.S.-Iran deal began to fade, yet again.

As OilPrice notes, on Monday, only six commodity vessels transited the Strait of Hormuz in either direction, down from 11 ships in the latest 10-day average, according to shipping data from Kpler cited by Reuters on Tuesday. Four commodity vessels moved inbound into the Persian Gulf via the Strait and two others exited outbound, the data showed.

Bloomberg data reveal a similar picture, only instead of 2 ships exiting, Bloomberg has only 1, bringing the total Monday commercial crossings to 5.

The inbound movement of commodity ships included two empty product tankers, while a small LNG carrier and a tanker shipping residual fuel exited the Persian Gulf with energy products en route to buyers.

At Bab el-Mandeb, the chokepoint between the Red Sea and the Arabian Sea, traffic remained unchanged on Monday compared to the 10-day average of about 24 vessels transiting the area.

Traffic at the Strait of Hormuz has slumped to the lowest in more than two months as security concerns have intensified with recent attacks on ships and persistent threats to shipping in the region.

After a brief respite between the middle of June and early July, when traffic at Hormuz rose with the tentative opening of the chokepoint as part of the now-dead U.S.-Iran memorandum of understanding, traffic of all vessels, including commodity carriers, plunged to a two-month low as of the end of July.

The security situation has deteriorated in the past two weeks, with Iran determined to exert control over vessels transiting the Strait of Hormuz and the Iran-aligned Houthis threatening Saudi-linked shipments in the Red Sea and the Bab el-Mandeb Strait.

Traffic at Hormuz needs to recover to nearly pre-war levels of around 80 to 100 ships per day just to stabilize energy markets, Bank of America warned earlier this week. Only around 5 to 10 ships per day are currently passing through the Strait of Hormuz, compared with roughly 140 before the war, Francisco Blanch, Bank of America’s head of commodities and derivatives research, told CNBC on Monday.

Tyler Durden Tue, 08/11/2026 - 14:40

A Tale Of 2 Deserts: Utah, California, & The Race To Power America's Next 50 Years

Authored by Lance Christensen via The Epoch Times,

In July, as America turned 250, a reactor the size of a minivan went critical in the red-rock desert of Emery County, Utah.

The company that built it, Valar Atomics, isn’t a Utah company at all. It’s based in El Segundo, California, in the shadow of the aerospace giants that once made Southern California the undisputed capital of American engineering.

But when President Donald Trump challenged American industry to bring a new nuclear reactor to life by Independence Day, Valar didn’t build its test site in California. It built it in Utah. That single fact says more about where these two states are headed than any think tank report could.

I have deep roots in my birthplace of Utah and a considered love for California, the state I have chosen to call home.

So, without picking a winner, we need to ask which state will actually do the work of building the next 50 years of American abundance, and why one of them keeps getting in its own way.

The Founders wrote the Declaration of Independence with the vision of building something more expansive than the servitude they endured for hundreds of years.

“Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” doesn’t happen by accident but can be possible only when a people reject the “multitude of New Offices, and … swarms of Officers [that] harrass [sic] our people, and eat out their substance.”

The men and women of the 18th-century revolution were dedicated to turning scarcity into abundance through sheer, sustained will and effort that would make its way westward in the mid-19th century without anyone’s permission.

As destinations for those migrations, Utah and California would asymmetrically benefit from these ambitious renegades over the years as they tamed the hostile landscapes of sagebrush, salt flats, and mountains.

My fourth-great-grandfather, Alexander Beckstead, was among the first to dig irrigation canals in Utah and construct blacksmith shops in the barren Great Salt Lake Valley. My wife’s family left Prussia to settle the Central Valley south of Sacramento as the unpredictable inland sea wreaked havoc on farms and cities.

Sam Brannan, the man who sailed from New York into sleepy Yerba Buena with 200 other Mormon ocean pioneers and announced the gold discovery on the streets of San Francisco, refused to make the trek eastward to the Great Salt Lake. He believed California’s beauty, resources, and location made it the better place to build, and he created town sites across the state and amassed a fortune that made him California’s first millionaire before dying in poverty.

Yet Brigham Young rejected the allure of California and, looking over the Wasatch Front, proclaimed, “This is the right place,” trusting that the desert would eventually “blossom as the rose.” And it has, with affluence oozing out of every corner of the state.

Although Utah’s population is a smaller portion of California’s post-World War II boom, it is currently blowing California’s deserts in Los Angeles, San Diego, and the Central Valley out of the water and doing so despite Brannan’s failed hustle a century and a half ago.

Young’s executive successor, Utah Gov. Spencer Cox, has spent this anniversary year arguing that the Founders’ “pursuit of happiness” was never about comfort. It was about character, self-mastery, purpose, and the discipline to build something larger than oneself. It is a high standard the state keeps reaching for.

In California, by contrast, it appears that the spirit of Eureka is lost, and there is less interest in the unglamorous work of actually building success.

That gap is largely political, not geological, resulting in a broken permitting and licensing structure. California’s sun, wind, water, energy, brainpower, and burgeoning artificial intelligence industry are no longer capable of producing some of the biggest innovations in the world as industries are drawn to other places with better regulatory environments.

My colleague Ed Ring has spent years documenting how California’s energy rules were designed for an era of managed scarcity, not abundance.

Ho Nieh, the current chairman of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, likes to say the country needs more power plants, not more PowerPoints. Utah took that injunction seriously and got a working reactor in less than a year.

California, home to the very engineers who designed it, seems unconcerned that Utah is eating our lunch while allowing the decline of its aging nuclear infrastructure.

California does not need to imitate Utah, but she needs to return to the instincts that once defined this state as the destination for every adventurer. The legislature needs to pass predictable, consistent regulation instead of duct-taping rules that shift to the whims of progressive activists every legislative session.

We need public officials to plan for both baseload power and the demand spikes an AI-driven economy will throw at the grid. We need a culture that rewards the people willing to meet our mountains instead of celebrating those who are content to rope them off. We need to refuse the doom-laced climate rhetoric that treats every power plant as an enemy rather than a tool.

Two deserts, two centuries, two paths. Only one of these states is currently spawning nuclear reactors. The other one is still capable of it, if we can find the political will to pursue an abundance agenda with the seriousness and discipline required to build and sustain it.

Tyler Durden Tue, 08/11/2026 - 14:05

Even Lefty Joe Scarborough Goes Nuclear On Dems For Refusing To Disavow Democratic Socialists

"Morning Joe" host Joe Scarborough went absolutely nuclear on elected Democrats Monday morning for refusing to denounce the party's rising far-left wing. He specifically cited far-left types such as Hasan Piker, a self-described Marxist who is the unofficial spokesman for the Democratic Socialists of America. Some DSA leaders have said in their own words that the goal is "to destroy America from within." 

Piker's toxic rhetoric has included attacks on America, calls to "kill capitalists," and inflammatory remarks promoting hatred and violence.

Hasan Piker calls on his followers to kill capitalists:

“Yeah kill them! KiII those motherfuckers and murder those motherfuckers in the streets. Let the streets soak in their fucking red capitalist blood, dude.”

Democrats are campaigning with him. pic.twitter.com/YiZxGgRkgc

— Eyal Yakoby (@EYakoby) April 9, 2026

In one clip, Piker said: "We want more immigrants to come into your countries, and then they're gonna f**k your sisters and then your daughters. We're here to destroy the White Race, bitch."

Hasan Piker says he wants to FLOOD illegals into the United States so they can "f*ck your sisters and daughters" to "destroy the white race"

I am demanding the Democratic Party voice PUBLICLY that they denounce Hasan Piker's comments.

If they don't, let this post be proof…

— Jack (@jackunheard) August 7, 2026

Piker has a long history of hatred and violent rhetoric, but this is nothing new for the DSA, which is systematically pushing revolutionary Marxism to collapse the nation from within. So, this toxic rhetoric should make sense.

"The most important thing we can do is take that (American) empire down from within"

DSA members make it clear what their goal is: destroying America. pic.twitter.com/Txy5Na21UG

— Canary Mission (@canarymission) July 5, 2026

Meanwhile, the DSA has devolved into a "red-green alliance" of Islamists and communists....

And the latest comments from Piker to surface include:

Unofficial Democract spokesman Hasan Piker says he loves the goal of impoverishing the White middle class

This is who Abdul El-Sayed and Francesca Hong are campaigning with pic.twitter.com/t9zEsYgHE1

— Libs of TikTok (@libsoftiktok) August 10, 2026

Here's Scarborough from yesterday:

But please, I don't need people telling me, oh, you have to just turn a blind eye to people saying that women getting raped on October 7th didn't matter in the grand scheme of things. Americans aren't going to support that!

This is not about me. This is about the Democrats once again fumbling the football on the two-yard line when they have a chance to make great gains, but being so woke—I don't know if you want to call it woke one, woke two, or woke three—but being too woke to call out the obvious! I swear to God, it's really crazy that we're even having this conversation.

If somebody says a woman being raped doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things, it's okay to call that person out and demand that candidates distance themselves from those people if you want to rule over a party and win elections.

If somebody says going to a rally the day after Hamas slaughters more Jews than any time since the Holocaust, it's okay for Chuck Schumer, it's okay for Hakeem Jeffries to call that despicable and demand that people distance themselves from that. That's okay!

So why are we bringing this up now? We're bringing this up now because it seems an awful lot like what was happening in 2024 when Democrats couldn't get out of their own way to win an election they should have won."

Scarborough: Democrats must condemn Hasan Piker and distance themselves from his extremist rhetoric.

Retweet and follow if you agree! pic.twitter.com/LlHg6tdp1U

— Democrats For Mike Rogers (@DemsForMike) August 10, 2026

Left-wing Senator Chuck Schumer had his chance to denounce the Democratic Socialists but instead recently said, "Being a big-tent party is a strength, not a weakness."

Senator Chuck Schumer thinks Democrat Socialists — who want to oust him as Leader — make the Democrat party stronger.

REPORTER: “Is the rise of the DSA good for your party?"

SCHUMER: “Being a big tent party is a strength not a weakness.” pic.twitter.com/17hSbCbtMx

— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) August 4, 2026

Scarborough is not the only voice in the Democratic Party denouncing the DSA.

Last Friday, Hillary Clinton warned about the unhinged socialist, saying on a podcast that Republicans are deploying what she called a "very effective" anti-communist attack against the Democratic Party's rising class of far-left candidates.

💥NEW: Hillary Clinton: "It's not just about Michigan — but the Republican messaging is: 'communist, socialist.' It's gonna be a VERY effective attack." pic.twitter.com/PS6ObKoZli

— Jason Cohen 🇺🇸 (@JasonJournoDC) August 7, 2026

Let's not forget:

DSA is far-left; let's not forget that. 

Understand here:

The rise of socialist and Marxist factions within the Democratic Party carries an obvious political risk ahead of midterms: years of radioactive sound bites have created an opposition-research gold mine and what could become a major "gift to Republicans" in the midterms.

The deeper concern is radicalization pipelines that aren't just colleges and funded by billionaire foundations via nonprofits but also influence linked to the communist regimes in Cuba and China, alongside an increasingly visible alliance between far-left activists and Islamist movements. Eyes on Middle East Children's Alliance (MECA) and China Marxist billionaire Neville Roy Singham. 

Tyler Durden Tue, 08/11/2026 - 13:45

Solid 3Y Auction Stops Through Ahead Of Tomorrow's CPI Report

Ahead of tomorrow's CPI report (which will come in tame thanks to continued housing disinflation), moments ago the US Treasury sold its first refunding auction, which came in very strong, stopping through the When Issued, and with above par metrics.

Pricing at a high yield of 4.291%, up from 4.179% in July and the highest since Feb 2025, the auction stopped through the When Issued 4.296% by 0.5bps, the 2nd consecutive through auction.

The bid to cover rose to 2.712, up from 2.600 and the highest since November; it was obviously well above the six-auction average of 2.606.

The internals were also solid, with Indirects awarded 64.24%, down slightly from 67.50% last month but in line with the recent average of 3.729%. And with Directs awarded 24.0%, well above the average of 21.7%, Dealers were left holding just 11.7%, one of the lowest Dealers this year. 

Overall, this was a rock solid auction, and it should eliminate any concerns that the bond market (at least) is worried about tomorrow's CPI print (as in coming in much hotter than expected).

Tyler Durden Tue, 08/11/2026 - 13:26

Syria's Hardline Sunni Regime Sentences Bashar al-Assad To Death In Absentia

The new government in Damascus has tried to press Moscow to return to Syria the former longtime President Bashar al-Assad. He's reportedly lived in a posh area of the Russian capital, under heavy security, since he was ousted in December 2024 and forced to flee.

Perhaps realizing they will never apprehend him, a Syrian court under the new hardline Sunni Hayat Tahrir al-Sham government has on Tuesday sentenced the former ruler to death after a trial in absentia, convicting him of war crimes and atrocities during the prior 14-years of internal war which overtook the country.

AFP/Getty Images

Judge Fakhr al-Din al-Aryan in Damascus convicted Assad for crimes including "premeditated murder, the intentional killing of more than one person, the intentional killing of children under 15 years... torture, torture leading to death, and deprivation of liberty on multiple occasions -- classified as crimes against humanity and war crimes."

"He is therefore sentenced to death," the court ruled. Other former high ranking officials in the Assad government are expected to be brought before the courts on similar charges. Many of them, including clerics and generals, are currently held in Syrian detention.

Some of these officials have been listed in AFP reporting: "The court also sentenced six former military and security officials in absentia to death including Assad's brother Maher, who ran the army's elite Fourth Division and also fled the country," AFP wrote.

"Those convicted included former defense minister Fahd al-Freij and Louay al-Ali, who headed military intelligence in Daraa province in 2011," the report noted.

The quasi-secular Syrian Ba'ath Party and Assad family had ruled Syria going back to 1970. This came about in the context of a permanent state of war with Israel, and particularly over the Golan Heights, as well as a long-running conflict with radical jihadist factions from within.

Prior to Assad family rule, Syria had suffered some dozen coups and changes of leadership, with many of these involving US and UK intelligence plots.

When there were signs of anti-Assad unrest in early 2011, the United States once again ramped up its covert intervention in Syria, pouring weapons and support into so-called 'moderate rebels' who went on to form the core of Syrian al-Qaeda and ISIS.

Meanwhile, meet the new Syrian government's top diplomatic point man to Washington, who previously kidnapped Americans as an AQ operative...

My interview with the Syrian chargé d'affaires to the US back when he was a member of Jabhat al-Nusra. pic.twitter.com/g0NSaH1WUp

— Lindsey Snell (@LindseySnell) July 28, 2026

Facing a Western and Gulf armed Sunni insurgency, the Assad government sought to put down the proxy war in brutal fashion. But ultimately after many years of covert and economic war, the West won out, and from this emerged Syrian al-Qaeda founder (Nusra Front/HTS) Abu Mohammad al-Jolani.

He is now the self-declared President Ahmed al-Sharaa, and the West and Gulf nations have embraced him and his Sunni-dominant government as their 'friend' and puppet.

As for Assad, there have been recent rumors and reports the and his family have traveled abroad at times, making secretive visits to the Gulf region.

Tyler Durden Tue, 08/11/2026 - 13:05

Despite Record Surge In Subprime Car Loan Originations, US Household Debt Dropped In Q2: First Since COVID

Something unprecedented happened in the second quarter: aggregate household debt balances declined by $13 billion, a 0.1% decline from Q1. Balances stood at $18.8 trillion, up $4.6 trillion since the end of 2019, just before the pandemic recession. But the reason why we say it was unprecedented, is that the Q2 drop was the first quarterly decline in total household debt since the second quarter of 2020, when the US economy was gripped by the covid lockdown shock leading to a historic deleveraging.

In fact, the only time aggregate household debt slides is during and right after periods of financial or social crisis. And yet, in Q2, risk assets soared.... which makes one wonder: just how bad is the economy really if one takes away the constant, debt-fueled (both on and off balance sheet) AI meltup?

Here is the breakdown by main category: 

• Mortgage debt at $13.12t after $13.19t in 1Q, a decrease of $74b
  • Mortgage delinquency rate fell to 0.99% from 1.09% prior quarter

According to the NY Fed, the decline was "due to a temporary gap in the reporting of mortgages on credit reports due to a transfer of servicing." Meanwhile, balances on home equity lines of credit (HELOC) rose by $13 billion, marking the 17th consecutive quarterly increase. Outstanding HELOC balances now total $459 billion, $142 billion above the low reached in 2022 Q1.

Non-housing debt balances, which apparently were not impacted by a tranfer transfer of servicing, grew by $48 billion, or 0.9%, from 2026Q1. Auto loan balances rose by $28 billion (1.7%), and credit card balances increased by $21 billion (1.7%). Student loan balances declined slightly (-0.4%). Other balances, which include retail cards and consumer finance loans, edged up by $6 billion to $568 billion. Key highlights:

• Student loan debt total at $1.651t from $1.658t in prior quarter, a decrease of $7b
  • Student loan delinquency rate rose to 10.6% from 10.34% prior quarter
     
• Credit card debt total at $1.263t from $1.242t in prior quarter, an increase of $21b
  • Credit card delinquency rate fell to 12.92% from 13.12% prior quarter

Some of the key charts from the latest report, staring with Mortgage Origination by credit score:

Auto loan origination by credit score. The notable thing here is the record surge in subprime originations (highest number of originations for sub 660 FICO applicants)...

... which was largely the result of a surge in 30-50 year olds getting a new auto loan.

In case going NINJA on auto loans wasn't enough, along with record credit card balances, we saw a much higher jump in credit card limits. Which means consumers have a LOT of dry powder.

Subprime-riddled auto loans aside, the one chart that may be most notable is the one showing that transition into delinquency b y loan type continues to rise, especially for Auto Loans, Mortgage and Credit Card. Of course, since student loans are already deep in the delinquency pipeline (most are 90+ days) there is simply nobody left to start the default process: most already have.

Commenting on the latest report, Joelle Scally, Economic Policy Advisor at the New York Fe said that "delinquency rates across most products have held steady over the past two years," adding that "new delinquencies for auto loans and credit cards remain at elevated levels, a trend we’ll continue to monitor."

And, ominously, as new delinquencies rise, the number of 90+ days delinquent loans are already near record highs for both credit cards, auto loans and student loans.

More in the full Household Credit presentation.

Tyler Durden Tue, 08/11/2026 - 12:35

Trump Weighs Federal Challenge To Mamdani's Socialist Tax "Experiment," Warns It Will Doom NYC

Summary:

• Trump Weighs Federal Challenge to New York Pied-à-Terre Tax
• Judge Temporarily Blocks Mamdani's Socialist Tax Scheme

Trump Weighs Federal Challenge to New York Pied-à-Terre Tax

President Trump said in a Truth Social post around lunchtime that his administration is examining whether the federal government has the legal authority to block NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani's dangerous political "experiment" before it can "destroy what was once a great City and State."

"It is pure Amateur Hour, and it's hard, as President of the United States of America, to sit back and watch it happen, especially to a place I once loved. Financial, and then Social, RUIN, is a 100% certainty - And then the Radical Left Jihadists charge Congestion Pricing on top of everything else," Trump said.

He continued, "This doesn't work in America, and must be stopped, NOW! I am looking to see if the Federal Government has any legal right to avert this disaster, before it is too late, for the millions of people who cherish New York and want to see it thrive, as opposed to becoming a filthy, crime-ridden, decrepit place of mockery and scorn."

"The City Screwed This Up": Judge Temporarily Blocks Mamdani's Pied-A-Terre Tax Scheme

A New York judge temporarily halted Mayor Zohran Mamdani's socialist experiment to impose a new tax on luxury second homes, ordering far-left City Hall officials to remove a controversial list doxing more than 900,000 homeowners from the public domain

The publicly accessible database exposed names, addresses, and property values, effectively creating an easily accessible targeting list for radical activists, including Luigi-worshipping far-left activists, amid City Hall's escalating war on property owners.

Related:

• "I've Been Doxed": Lefty Podcaster Scott Galloway Rips Mamdani After Landing On Socialist's Rich Target List

Bloomberg reports that Justice Wayne Ozzi temporarily restrained City Hall from proceeding with the new pied-à-terre tax and required the city to remove the online list of properties that would be targeted by the tax and halt further action based on roughly 17,000 notices mailed to property owners.

A hearing is scheduled for Aug. 31.

"The city screwed this up… got it wrong… stop the train and make them do it over," Randy Mastro, a former deputy mayor, told the court. Mastro is the one who brought the suit on behalf of three New York homeowners. 

"We are very gratified by the judge's decision, which has vindicated the rights of hundreds of thousands of New York City homeowners who were subjected to a process they never should have been a part of in the first place," Mastro said after the ruling.

On Monday, Mamdani noted Mastro's role in suits challenging his socialist housing policies. 

"You know, there are few things more certain in New York City than death, taxes and Randy Mastro filing a lawsuit against this administration," the mayor said at a press conference.

"There are a few things more certain here today than death, taxes and Randy Mastro filing a lawsuit against this administration," NYC Mayor Mamdani says when asked about the new lawsuit filed by Mastro on behalf of NYC homeowners over the rollout of the pied-à-terre tax pic.twitter.com/BTnvLPvgly

— Rebecca C. Lewis (@_rebeccaclewis) August 10, 2026

He continued, "So we look forward to vigorously defending our city's position in court as we have done so with the previous lawsuits that he has filed and I'm sure with the lawsuits that he will continue to file in the months and years to come."

Last month, Mastro also filed a separate complaint on behalf of a group of NYC landlords who sued to void a rent freeze approved in June, arguing that Mamdani improperly influenced the Rent Guidelines Board's vote and ignored evidence of soaring operating costs for landlords. This plays into the broader socialist endgame: bankrupt landlords and create conditions for City Hall to seize distressed apartment buildings. 

Mamdani has said the new pied-à-terre tax will help fund safer streets, safer schools, and "the city that New Yorkers deserve."

Yet we know socialists do not live in economic reality, and the fact that they had to dox homeowners suggests an alternative motive: they want to seize the means of production. Putting such a list out in the public domain for their radical left foot soldiers to access suggests that wealthy homeowners will be targeted. This is dangerous, especially given the rhetoric pushed by Mamdani's friend Hasan Piker, who recently said, "Kill capitalists."

Tyler Durden Tue, 08/11/2026 - 12:30

Vitalik Buterin Says Ethereum Is Betting Its Future On Quantum Security And AI

Authored by Jason Nelson via Decrypt.co,

Ethereum co-founder Vitalik Buterin says quantum resistance, privacy, and AI-assisted security have become greater priorities for Ethereum since he published his 2023 roadmap.

In a post on X on Monday, Buterin said he updated his 2023 roadmap to compare its original goals with Ethereum’s current “Strawmap”—a working outline of the network’s long-term technical priorities.

“What's most striking, however, is that some completely new things are in the strawmap that are not in this diagram, because they were not in the 2023 roadmap at all,” Buterin wrote. “These reflect changing priorities.”

Among those priorities are stronger privacy and scaling designed for a post-quantum world, alongside efforts to push the “lean-ification of the spec,” or simplify Ethereum’s technical specifications.

“A common theme in scaling, found in both state types and zkzk frames (both new ideas), is that instead of trying to maximally scale all Ethereum activity,” Buterin wrote.

“We try to create specialized mechanisms that have more restrictive properties that make them more scaling-friendly, while supporting the heaviest loads incurred by users and applications today (eg. token transfers, swaps) and tomorrow (eg. privacy protocols).”

According to Buterin, advances in AI are making it practical to apply the technique more extensively to Ethereum.

Buterin said Ethereum is increasingly relying on STARKs, a cryptographic technology used to verify computations, and AI-assisted verification, to check that the protocol works as intended.

“This can only be safe with formal verification, which is itself only feasible with modern AI tools,” he wrote.

Buterin’s post comes as Ethereum has accelerated preparations for “Q-Day” and the potential threat posed by quantum computers.

In January, Buterin urged developers to adopt quantum-resistant cryptography before the threat becomes immediate, and the Ethereum Foundation formed a dedicated post-quantum team.

In February, Buterin outlined a phased plan to replace four potentially vulnerable components of Ethereum’s cryptographic architecture.

In July, Buterin put quantum safety and privacy at the center of his proposed “Lean Ethereum” overhaul, which calls for replacing quantum-vulnerable cryptography with quantum-safe alternatives.

“Ethereum will be quantum-safe. Ethereum will put users' privacy first. Ethereum will be secure,” Buterin wrote.

“Ethereum will be censorship-resistant. Ethereum will be highly performant and scalable while satisfying the above. And Ethereum will be Lean.”

Tyler Durden Tue, 08/11/2026 - 12:05

Strategic Autonomy Is Running Dry

By Bas van Geffen, senior macro strategist at Rabobank

Yesterday, my road cycling took me along the Lek River, which branches off from the Rhine. I frequently ride the path along this river, but the Lek was almost unrecognisable in the distance and what is normally part of the riverbed has now run dry.

It’s a very tangible reminder of numbers we’ve recently been watching on our screens: Upstream, at Kaub, the water level in the Rhine has fallen to historical lows. And a new heatwave that is due to hit Europe, is bound to make matters worse: current forecasts see the level drop to less than 5 centimetres above the station’s zero mark by the end of the week.

The Rhine fell to its lowest ever levels at points in Germany and the Netherlands as heatwave conditions continue

Ships were already forced to reduce the amount of cargo they carry, but soon they may be unable to sail the entire river. The drought is effectively splitting this key piece of infrastructure into two halves between Cologne and Frankfurt. Inland shipping costs have surged, and companies are scrambling to find alternative transport for resources and finished product. This, as diesel prices in Germany have largely rebounded in the last month.

Concerned about the impact for local industry, several German Bundeslander are suspending Sunday driving bans for trucks and lorries. Indeed, the hit to economic activity will be noticeable.

But these droughts also underline that a once-convenient shipping route is becoming unreliable. Higher shipping costs and possible disruptions of key supplies add to high energy costs and other headwinds facing German industry. And although Germany has earmarked billions for the revitalization of key infrastructure, this will probably be insufficient to remedy the issue.

That’s a problem for Brussels’ strive to regain strategic autonomy – and a physical challenge for European plans to revive key industries and build new ones on European soil.

European –and American– plans to move critical industries back home are increasingly causing geopolitical friction. This is, after all, a zero-sum game where China in particular stands to lose.

Beijing realizes this too. China recently broadened its travel restrictions to include experienced engineers with knowledge of critical technologies such as rare-earth processing, solar panels or battery technologies. Those who “may endanger technological security” can be barred from leaving the country. The tightened rules must prevent that these engineers help companies set up production lines in rival countries.

These restrictions may clash with the European Commission’s planned Industrial Accelerator Act, which requires that large foreign investments in Europe’s critical industries generate knowledge transfers and local research & development.

In markets, the joint Japanese-US intervention in the JPY exchange rate is starting to lose its grip on the currency. The prospect of further FX interventions continues to provide some support, but USD/JPY is gradually drifting higher, and the currency has and it has reversed about half of the peak-to-trough move versus both EUR and USD.

As we noted last week, these FX interventions may prop up the currency temporarily, but it will probably not last unless there are structural improvements in the yen’s fundamentals. Last week, we also learned that the government’s plans are unlikely to do this in the near-term.

Interest rate differentials are also weighing on the currency, and the central bank is signalling that it may remedy this to some extent. Sources within the Bank of Japan told reporters that policymakers could raise rates again in September. The comments follow a relatively hawkish write-up of the July meeting.

The Australian dollar also slipped briefly after today’s RBA decision. The central bank kept its policy rate unchanged as expected, but traders read some dovish language in the statement, and the downward revisions to the bank’s growth and inflation forecasts.

However, RBA Governor Bullock corrected that in her press conference. She commented that policymakers debated whether to hold or to hike, adding that it is “quite possible” that the RBA needs to hike rates again. Monetary policy is currently seen as “a bit restrictive” and domestic demand has slowed in line with expectations. But, according to the governor, the domestic economy is still operating above capacity. So, consumer spending growth and the economy need to slow further for capacity pressures to ease sufficiently to return inflation to target on the projected timeline.

As our Australia strategist noted prior to today’s meeting, the RBA seems to hope that the three rate hikes since the start of the year will be sufficient to dampen domestic demand. However, we are not entirely convinced that it is. Accordingly, we forecast that the central bank will have to raise rates once more, in November

Tyler Durden Tue, 08/11/2026 - 11:30

Zelensky Claims North Korea Sending Up To 50K Troops To Russia, Presses Seoul To Send Missiles

Ukraine's President Zelensky has in fresh remarks warned North Korea against its deepening involvement with Russian in executing the war against Ukraine.

Zelensky's late Monday words alleged that Russia recently received additional ballistic missiles from Pyongyang and is preparing to deploy more North Korean troops, after already sending thousands to fight on the Russian side.

KCNA via KNS

While reports from the last couple years have estimated that North Korea has maintained up to around 10,000 troops in Russia related to the 'special military operation' in Ukraine, Zelensky is now floating a huge number of projected new DPRK forces.

It started on Saturday when Zelensky took to X to say - without evidence - that "a decision has been made for 30,000 ⁠to 50,000 North Koreans to be deployed on the territory of Russia,” a higher figure than his estimate of 30,000 in July." He didn't specify where he obtained the alleged data from.

He also said that Ukrainian intelligence had located some North Korean missiles in Ukraine's territory, without further elaborating. What is clear is the Moscow and Pyongyang do have a robust defense cooperation pact, which was signed in June of 2024.

On Tuesday Ukrainian officials said that overnight at least nine people were killed in new Russian ballistic missile attacks, and scores wounded.

Zelensky then newly said in reference to the southeastern city of Zaporizhzhia, "The city was struck with North Korean ballistic missiles, Zircons, and guided aerial bombs" - and he described "a vicious attack, calculated to,  inflict maximum damage specifically on civilian infrastructure."

But again, no proof of the North Korean origins of the missiles was forthcoming. "It ⁠is absolutely clear that North Korea will ​continue ⁠to build its experience in modern warfare, receive licenses from Russia, and receive all kinds of military tools from them," Zelensky has also said.

Interestingly, Zelensky is using this narrative to try and goad South Korea into changing its policy and export heavy weapons, including anti-air defenses, to Ukraine:

Zelensky said North Korea was gaining valuable battlefield experience through its cooperation with Russia and urged South Korea to provide Ukraine with air defense systems and other capabilities.

"They have a legal restriction under their Constitution. But we would like to have this cooperation and are counting on it. Our diplomats are in contact," Zelensky wrote.

🚨 Zelensky: Russia struck Zaporizhzhia with North Korean ballistic missiles

According to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, Russia launched more than 120 drones at Ukraine overnight, most of them Shaheds. In Kyiv, a missile strike damaged an infectious diseases hospital… https://t.co/khmFsf7xcu pic.twitter.com/Xj2ORoM4S8

— NEXTA (@nexta_tv) August 11, 2026

However, this new pressure campaign on Seoul prompted one senior South Korean official to tell The Korea Times, "South Korea's supply of defense materials to any country has always been carried out in accordance with domestic law."

The official made clear that there is no policy change in the works, and that South Korean weapons will not start flowing to Kiev anytime soon - or this is the official response at least.

Tyler Durden Tue, 08/11/2026 - 11:15

Wheat Futures Volatile As Black Sea Crisis And Hormuz Chokepoint Spark Concerns

Chicago wheat futures are coiling for a breakout (one way or another) as ongoing Russia-Ukraine attacks on Black Sea grain infrastructure and bulk carriers threaten exports from one of the world's most important breadbaskets.

Most-active Chicago wheat has been choppy in the last few days...

Hard red winter wheat gained as much as 2.7% to $7.505 a bushel.

Soft Red Winter wheat futures are poised for a much larger breakout if prices sustain a move above $7 a bushel.

Bloomberg noted Monday that Turkey temporarily suspended Black Sea transits by its cargo ships over the weekend amid ongoing maritime security risks in the critical shipping corridor. Ukraine warned that its agricultural exports for the 2026-27 season could be halved due to Russian attacks.

Joe Davis, director of commodities at brokerage Futures International, was quoted by the outlet as saying that potential supply disruptions had boosted US-grown hard red winter varieties more sharply because the grain is seen as a direct competitor to higher-protein milling wheat from the Black Sea region and Europe.

"While the disruptions don't necessarily translate into immediate additional US export business," Davis said, adding, "they do tighten the global exportable supply outlook and balance sheets, forcing importers to diversify origins and keeping support under higher-quality wheat values." 

With wheat prices inching higher and approaching $7, which could spark upside momentum, a gauge of global food prices tracked by the UN climbed to a three-year high in July.

Disruptions not only in the Black Sea but also in the Strait of Hormuz, combined with adverse weather conditions across key US and other key growing regions as El Niño risks rise, are certainly putting a bid under food prices, as the worst may be yet to come.

UBS analysts outlined five forces driving grocery bills higher in a note last week (report here). They asked a very important question: Is this the end of cheap food?

Tyler Durden Tue, 08/11/2026 - 10:50

"Niceness As Whiteness": Professors Denounce Politeness As Privilege

Authored by Jonathan Turley,

We have previously discussed how many professors seem to compete in finding new forms of racism in every facet of society and education.

Astrophysics, math, runoffs, science, statistics, and meritocracy have all been denounced as racist. In this academic cottage industry, professors secure publications and speaking opportunities by identifying racism in the expressions, images, or entire fields. Even time itself has been declared racist.

Now, however, academics have found another undiscovered continent of white privilege: niceness.

When I saw a story in The College Fix on a study of “niceness as Whiteness,” I was skeptical and decided to take a look. The study by Vanderbilt Postdoctoral Research Fellow Abigail Beneke, Professors Benjamin Fisher (U. Wisconsin-Madison), F. Chris Curran (U. Florida), and Samantha Viano (George Mason) was first flagged by Dr. James Nuzzo.

The paper “Niceness as Whiteness in School Police Officers’ Perceptions of Student Arrest” addresses the “perceptions of arrest” by school resource officers, or SROs) in two school districts.

The officers appear to be precisely what you are looking for in an SRO: empathetic and reluctant to make arrests. The researchers admit that they try to avoid arrests. However, according to the authors, hidden behind those sympathetic approaches was, of course, a boiling caldron of racism in terms of the racial disparity of those arrested.

Indeed, the researchers realized that it was the niceness itself that was the evidence of oppressive “Whiteness.” Indeed, the officers may not want to be engines of racism and use “niceness” as a “coping mechanism,” but do so by deluding themselves and others that they are nice:

“Nice SROs did not want to arrest children. Nice police officers thought of themselves as well-meaning. Yet, they expressed being required to arrest children because of real or imagined mandates. They used niceness as a strategy for upholding a system of Whiteness that systematically privileges White people and excludes those who fall outside of Whiteness. Niceness hinders possibilities for the types of political, communal relationships central to authentic care.”

The paper makes it sound like everyone would be better off, or at least more honest, to return to hostile, racist-spewing officers. The reason is that niceness is an  “enduring component of Whiteness” which “allows predominantly White people to elide how their own actions contribute to inequality by maintaining a sense of their own benevolence.”

The evidence of niceness includes such findings as how officers work at “minimiz[ing] the negative impact of arrest by highlighting their own goodness.” (This includes saying things like “You want to listen to the radio? You want the window down? Is there a station you want to listen to?” after an arrest.)

Then there is the fact that these officers have good relationships and perspectives of the students. Again, it is just a shield of “whiteness”:

“SROs used niceness as Whiteness in their recounts of arrest … by highlighting the positive relationships they had with students they arrested…As with highlighting their own goodness, highlighting these positive relationships reframes violence (i.e., arrest) that contributes to racial inequality as a positive, since students still like the SROs. This strategy emphasizes the officer’s ability to retain his niceness—by virtue of the maintained interpersonal relationship—despite having arrested the student.”

The paper is an example of ideological screeds posing as academic research. Based on a few interviews, the researchers simply declare the empathy and relationships to be shields perpetuating “whiteness.” They cite other studies identifying niceness as a whiteness tactic:

“Prior research has demonstrated how primarily White women educators use niceness to uphold Whiteness in their work with children (Bissonnette 2016; Drake & Rodriguez 2022; Gardiner et al., 2023; Vlach et al., 2022; Wiborg, 2022). We found niceness was also present in the work of SROs, suggesting the potential for broader application of niceness to well-intentioned actors working in structurally violent systems. In addition to framing niceness as a means of excusing behavior that upholds Whiteness, we equally center the structural binds that delimit SROs’ capacity for providing care. In doing so, we identify niceness as a coping mechanism for arresting children.”

At these universities (Vanderbilt, Wisconsin, George Mason, and the University of Florida), these faculty members and their obvious agenda are viewed as ideal choices to teach their students.

With four kids, I found the SROs at their schools to be extraordinary and popular figures. They would routinely intervene with kids to see if they were having trouble or try to direct them away from trouble. It turns out that everything that parents valued in their SROs was a perpetuation of privilege, according to these researchers.

While the researchers insist that “we do not intend to demonize individual SROs,” they reward the cooperating officers by twisting their every comment as revealing their deep white privilege. Presumably, they conveyed to the SROs that this would be a fair, unbiased study. It was neither, and, perhaps reaffirming their own triumph over racism, they were not a bit nice about it.

Tyler Durden Tue, 08/11/2026 - 10:35

US Existing Home Sales Disappoint (Again) In July, Hover Near Record Lows

With mortgage rates rising and the 'low hire, no fire' economy leaving many anxious about their household finances, the ugly spring selling season has not been followed by a consistent rebound in existing home sales in the US.

After falling 1.4% MoM in June (revised up from a 2.4% MoM decline), US existing home sales fell again -1.7% MoM in July (worse than the -1.0% MoM exp). This dragged the annual increase in sales down to just 0.74% YoY...

Overall, existing home sales SAAR is holding very modestly off record lows, holding just above the 4 million mark...

“Home sales have been remarkably stable, even amid the rising mortgage rate environment of the past few months,” Lawrence Yun, NAR chief economist, said in a statement.

He added that “there’s no doubt that the housing market would be thriving if average mortgage rates were to return near 6%.”

In recent months, home-financing costs and prices went in the wrong direction. Thirty-year mortgage rates have been climbing since the late-February start of the war in Iran, and recently reached a one-year high of 6.81%.

The median sales price increased 2% from a year earlier to $434,100.

That was the highest selling price for any July on record and extended a stretch of annual price gains that started in summer 2023.

Inventories of new homes for sale remain relatively high (and are thus pressuring homebuilders to choke back on additional supply)...

But, the inventory of existing homes for sale fell slightly (-0.6%) from a year earlier to 1.54 million - the first annual decline since Oct 2023...

By region, previously owned home sales in the South, the nation’s biggest home-selling region, decreased 3.1% to a four-month low. Sales in the Midwest fell 2%. They were unchanged in the West and up in the Northeast.

First-time buyers accounted for 29% of sales in July, down from 33% a month earlier.

One silver lining is the nation’s affordability crunch is easing when compared with last year as rising household income growth has generally outpaced home price appreciation, Mark Fleming, chief economist at First American Financial Corp., wrote in a recent blog.

However, even some of that improvement has been eroded lately because of rising mortgage rates.

Tyler Durden Tue, 08/11/2026 - 10:09

A Modest Proposal: Performance Reviews For Senators

Authored by Frank Miele via RealClearPolitics,

It seems as though only one thing motivates Congress to act - the threat of elections.

That's why both the House and Senate have moved to pass a continuing resolution to keep funding the government until December. Originally funding was going to run out on Oct. 1, the date that was decided during the last shutdown crisis.

But with virtually every member of the House of Representatives and one-third of the Senate up for election in November, almost no one in Congress wanted to call attention to their own inaction by letting a new shutdown occur.

It's the political version of Pavlov's dogs. You know, the famous experiment by the Russian scientist Ivan Pavlov who trained canines to salivate at the sound of a bell because they associated the bell with the expectation of food being served.

The same thing happens with members of Congress when they hear that an election is scheduled within the next three months. Suddenly they want to be productive.

A representative can ignore constituents for 22 months and then suddenly rediscover them during the last two. And senators can become unresponsive to their voters for most of their six-year term, enjoying junkets and the other fruits of power while being under no obligation to get anything done.

Makes you almost sympathize with the Democratic Socialists of America, who have made abolition of the Senate one of their top priorities. Six-year terms have their virtues, but they also make senators especially prone to forgetting who they work for.

But maybe we could salvage the Senate if we could adapt Pavlov's experiment in a way that would hopefully train senators to do their job on the regular instead of just once in a blue moon.

Call this my modest proposal. Like Jonathan Swift's famous satirical essay proposing that poor Irish parents sell their infants as food, it isn't intended as a serious legislative recommendation. It's meant to expose an absurdity - in this case, a Congress that suddenly remembers how to govern only when voters are about to fire it.

Sadly, the proposal has little likelihood of being put into effect by those senators whom it would put on notice. Yet if its argument is accurate, then we can at least all agree that senators - and yes, all members of Congress - are little more than trained monkeys. If only we could train them well, perhaps they would do their job more consistently.

No doubt you are wondering how we could possibly accomplish such a remarkable goal. It's a relatively simple mechanism, akin to the bell that Pavlov taught dogs to associate with food.

Namely, the Senate can institute a rule that once a month, the citizen constituents of each state will be able to vote electronically on whether they wish to retain or dismiss their senator.

Now, before you worry about constitutional entanglements and the risk of meddling in the results of such digital ballots, understand that the votes will not be binding. Instead they will simply keep senators on their toes, just as the threat of real elections does today. The results will be widely publicized, and any senator who consistently fails to win majority support from his state's voters will be publicly humiliated.

But if it were taken seriously, it could have a much wider impact. Political parties could guarantee additional campaign support to senators who consistently earned the confidence of their state's voters. And the opposite would be true as well. Suppose a senator has only a 30% retention rate from the citizens of his or her state. Donors would flee. Challengers would emerge. Even the most complacent senators might begin to reconsider their inaction.

The genius of elections is not that they remove bad politicians. It's that the possibility of removal changes behavior long before Election Day. Congress doesn't need more elections. It simply needs to remember every month that one is coming. Perhaps Pavlov's bell could do the trick.

And then, instead of Congress passing a continuing resolution to fund the government for a month or two, we could return to regular order and watch appropriations bills passed for an entire year. What a revolutionary concept!

Frank Miele, retired editor of the Daily Inter Lake in Kalispell, Mont., is a columnist for RealClearPolitics. His book "The Media Matrix: What If Everything You Know Is Fake" is available from his Amazon author page. Visit him at HeartlandDiaryUSA.com or follow him on Facebook @HeartlandDiaryUSA and on X/Gettr @HeartlandDiary.

Tyler Durden Tue, 08/11/2026 - 09:45